J 999 Jersey Personalised Number Plate

A REGISTRATION plate which was expected to fetch up to £40,000 at auction on Wednesday failed to sell.

J999, which is assigned to a scooter of ‘insignificant value’, went under the hammer at Glencoe Auction Rooms in St Lawrence.

But it failed to reach its reserve price.

Although nowadays it is strapped to the back of a two-wheeler which has seen better days, it may once have been attached to the star asset of Pontypandy Fire Station.

A JEP investigation (a quick search on Google) has uncovered evidence that the J-plate once belonged to Jupiter – the shiny red fire engine driven by Fireman Sam.

It's not clear whether the Welsh firefighting hero is now trying to raise some much needed capital after falling on hard times, or whether they are simply two registration plates which happen to share the same number.

More Number plate Auction news:

A TEAMNZ number plate being auctioned on Trade Me has reached a bid of $23,000, 11 hours before closing.

User floppy9 has listed the plate from Taranaki with a starting bid of $20,000.

It urged buyers to "be the first to show them off around the streets of New Zealand".

Peter Burling was at the helm for Emirates Team New Zealand when the Kiwis overwhelmed Cup holders Oracle Team USA 7-1 off Bermuda to lift the Auld Mug on June 27.

Floppy9 advised to hold on to it until the next America's Cup as a good investment.

The plates, according to the seller, had been bought a very long time ago.

So what are the top selling number plates in the UK? The DVLA has been selling private plates to UK motorists since 1989. During this time, there have been a number of records set, but most of the top 10 have been bought in the past 15 years. Here’s what currently makes the list:

25 0 – A Ferrari dealer bought this for £518k in 2014. It is now on a £10 million Ferrari 250 SWB.
F 1 – A businessman, Afzal Khan, bought this for £440k in 2008 and put it on his McLaren-Mercedes SLR.
S 1 – This was bought in 2008 for £404k by an anonymous buyer.
1 D – Businessman Nabil Bishara bought this plate in 2009 (before One Direction was formed, so it is not a reference to the band) for £352k.
M 1 – Businessman Mike McCoomb bought this number plate in 2006 for £331k, apparently for his son, who was 10 at the time.
VIP 1 – Chelsea owner and businessman Roman Abramovich bought this plate for £285k in 2006.
51 NGH – This number plate, which looks like the surname Singh, was sold in 2006 for £254k.
1 RH – Businessman Robert Haverson bought this in 2006 for £247k.
K1 NGS – This reg plate, which looks like the word “kings”, was bought anonymously in 1993 for £231k.
1 0 – This very simple but striking number plate was bought anonymously in 2009 for £170k.

These are large amounts of money, but they are all small compared to the top-selling number plates found in other parts of the world. Abu Dhabi, in the UAE, has the record for the most expensive number plate ever sold. That number plate was a simple “1”. It was bought in 2008 by businessman Saeed Abdul Ghaffar Khouri for £7.25 million.

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